504.418A2/241: Telegram
The Minister in the Netherlands (Diekema) to the Acting Secretary of State
[Received 8:17 p.m.]
49. From Miller. Conference No. 17.
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… One of the general clauses adopted Saturday night permits signature until December 31, 1930, but even so I think it better to say at this Conference that we will not sign. The objections are obvious now and we might as well make our position clear. A new and to my mind fatal objection to the whole convention is that the committee Saturday night voted down a clause permitting future special agreements on nationality between particular states. It is quite impossible for us to tie our hands in this regard by any general convention.
I shall not cable the general clauses at length unless you wish as they are pages long and mostly are not material on the question of signature. Some of them are not yet definitive.